The discovery of a body is a common opening for a thriller, but Joyce Carol Oates being the master of domestic thrillers that she is, knows when to stick with the tides and when to delve into uncharted waters. Instead of leading the reader straight to the body of Mr Francis Fox – the subject of Fox, the latest Oates novel – she takes us on a meandering wander through South Jersey wetlands, beginning from the simple olfactory perspective of a loyal dog.
From the animals circling the smell of rotting flesh, to the citizens disturbed by the news of a teacher’s unexpected demise, Fox dedicates itself to the lives, unfortunately, ill-fatedly, touched by the man in question.
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Oates actively invites comparison with Nabokov’s Lolita, as Mr Fox shares more than just a literal naming and proclivity for prepubescent children. Of course, the scholar has read Lolita and takes great pride in his vitriolic disgust of the paedophile narrator. Although Fox cannot see it, his attempts to distance himself from Lolita only brings him closer to Humbert Humbert. The two are alike in their blind dignity, seeing their specific desires as sophisticated tastes compared to the garden variety paedophile. But where Fox differs from Lolita, apart from how Oates relishes in the images of Fox’s decaying body, are in its multiverse of narratives.
While Lolita came under fire for refusing to give the titular character her voice, Fox is in fact drowned out by the many unique ways he has affected those around him. There are moments where Mr Fox’s pedantic tone is heard, but far more often in Oates’s continued dedication to critiquing societal perceptions of men, it is those that learned from him, worked with him, and studied his crimes that fill the novel.
In this way we see exactly how society excuses sexually violent predators and turns away from the heinous acts of its most troubling citizens, the vile products of patriarchy. Oates demonstrates that what is more horrifying than the discovery of his body and his crimes are those that still delude themselves even when confronted with his secrets. Fox is a tome that does more than just fill in Lolita’s gaps, it is engrossing even as it horrifies and reminds us that we cannot nor should not look away.
